“Boom!”

Immediately after he placed his fingers into the fire, an immense heat wave burst out. Riding the wave, the cyan sparks sped towards the seven dark globes of energy in the sky.

“Whoosh!”

The sparks enlarged against the air current they created and merged to become a spirit selenic beast which violently collided into Qi Xiu’s stance.

“Bang!”

Although contained in the City Lord’s rune shield, the whole mountain trembled from the impact. The platforms closest to Ye Wei and Qi Xiu’s fight began to shake violently and they were on the verge of collapsing.

The cyan sparks of fire crashed into the black energy globes and erupted. A burst of blinding light shone in the sky and forced many to close their eyes because it was nearly as bright as the midday sun.

‘I never thought it would be this powerful... Pu Yuan always told me how much stronger stances composed of specialized runes were compared to ordinary stances, but I never had a chance to actually test it before now! My stance is only a high-level Spirit stance but there are twelve specialized runes intermixed with the thirty-six normal ones; this should be enough to beat his Myst stance.’

Ye Wei remained calm and calculating. He was as cautious as it was his first time using what he had learned in a real combat, and therefore he wasn’t sure how effective it would be.

Even considering stances’ power vary depending on the user’s strength many would say Ye Wei was mad to use a Spirit stance against the Seven Black Flare stance. Although Ye Wei had the strength of a condensed prime Warrior under the Supernova stance’s effect, it would take a returned prime Warrior to confidently deal with a Warrior’s Myst stance with just a Spirit stance.

It was to everyone’s surprise that the two stances were now caught in a deadlock.

Qi Xiu became furious. His face began to twist in anger as he struggled to accept the first flare of his stance could not crush a mere Spirit stance.

“Just wait! And don’t get cocky just because you dealt with one, there are more to come!” Qi Xiu screamed as he fired off the second, third, and the fourth flares. They were only becoming stronger after each burst from the flaring orbs.

“Boom! Boom!”

The energy of Qi Xiu’s and Ye Wei’s stances kept engulfing, crashing, grinding, and reducing each other.

With the fourth explosion Qi Xiu was starting to gain an advantage as the black energy globes grew even larger and eventually suppressed Ye Wei’s runic fire entirely.

“Is Qi Xiu going to win?”

“He can not hold himself against Qi Xiu’s stance anymore!”

The darkness of Qi Xiu’s stance was consuming the green light like a rising tide. It then quickly spread and began to swallow Ye Wei.

“He is still young, maybe in a few years he will be able to beat Qi Xiu and even stronger opponents! I look forward to seeing that!”

‘I can’t hold this much longer!’ Ye Wei felt his energy being drained quickly, ‘but I can’t show the Supernova stance’s second evolution just yet...’

It was impossible for anyone to tell that Ye Wei had the luxury to choose how he should hide his true power in this seemingly dire situation, nor did they have a way to find out.

A spark of inspiration hit Ye Wei as he started channeling his Qi using the Falling Star formula. He also incorporated the Shifting Star formula in the way he had with his Qi when it flowed through his body earlier, after which he started smiling.

Some of the audience thought Ye Wei was happy to face his death, and even the powerful cultivators on the cloud platform could not figure out the reason why Ye Wei was smiling. The strongest ones among them were the only people who were surprised when they realized he was still not showing his all.

“Do you know the saying about shoes and feet?” Ye Wei smiled and drew a long rune sequence for the Selenic Armor stance.

“Huh? But he used the exact same defensive stance before and it was shattered by Qi Xiu!” The audience was confused by Ye Wei’s decision and worried for his life as they did not know that he had just learned Polaris’ Star Shifter formula and therefore it was a different book with the same cover.

The fourth strike landed on Ye Wei’s body, and he just took a few steps back before he regained his balance but the armor was completely intact and there were was no signs of injuries on him at all.

“What?”

“He actually blocked it?!”

The gathering crowd was shocked and confused. They did not see how it was possible for Ye Wei to defend himself against Qi Xiu’s explosive power.

“Ha, what a genius!” The City Lord laughed and clapped as he looked at Ye Wei.

He then explained to the confused faces, “The kid basically learned how Star Shifter works. It must have been when Qi Xiu used it to redirect the force of his punches. He then infused the principles of Star Shifter into his own defensive stance. You all know how the Seven Dark Flare stance works, and just now the kid used Star Shifter to divert the focused energy of the flare strikes so it would just slide off the surface of his runic armor. Therefore he reduced the dangerous stance into an unfocused wave of energy. That was truly impressive.”

“Is that even possible?” Knowing better than to doubt the City Lord, everyone was shocked to hear his explanation as they had never heard of cultivators who could learn their opponent’s technique during a fight and then immediately apply it, infusing it into his own stances. They could not imagine what Ye Wei’s future held.

Qi Xiu screamed, and his face twisted in shock. He became increasingly frustrated because he did not understand how Ye Wei had managed to handle his stance with ease.

‘Fifth, sixth, and seventh!’

The flare bursts became stronger and stronger as Qi Xiu was overwhelmed with rage while Ye Wei was smiling with joy. ‘Star Shifter formula is very interesting to say the least. I think I will even be able to infuse the Qi flow to Driftwind Steps to create a completely new speed enhancing technique. What a shame it is for Qi Xiu to know the formula but not how to fully use it in combat.’

“I just showed you that your stance means nothing to me. Are your stubborn or just stupid?” Ye Wei mumbled then grunted, ‘Searing Selenic Palm!’

The green spark on Ye Wei’s hand burned bright as he leaped towards the weakest spot of Qi Xiu’s black sun. He also channeled his modified Selenic Armor stance to defend himself. The black energy burst slid off his body as he expected.

“Boom!”

Ye Wei whizzed in the air above the platform as the black and green energy waves turned into two raging tornados upon contact.

“Crack! Crack!”

It was now when the City Lord realized that the runic shield he had casually made moments ago was not enough to contain this fight, and that he has underestimated the contestants on platform ten. Countless cracks and fissures formed on the shield’s surface and they quickly grew deeper and longer. With a sudden rumble, the two Qi tornados broke out of the containment.

Around the platform, the gathering students were all knocked into the air, and farther away young cultivators with less than a seven-star Warrior’s cultivation all becoming pale and started spitting up blood as the impact struck.

In the middle of the cloud platform, the City Lord was stunned. He immediately stood up and his hands rained down thousands of runes, creating a thicker, tougher shield around platform ten.

“This is crazy... Are we watching two condensed prime Warriors fight each other?” Everyone was still recovering and wondering if the fight was over.

Although everyone outside the newly made shield was rather safe, it did not look good from the inside. The platform was being ravaged by the trapped energy, and it was starting to wobble as cracks and fissures gradually ate into the platform’s core.

The dust inside the shield turned green and brightened as the dark flares were put out by the sheer force of Ye Wei’s green fire. His fist then mercilessly struck onto Qi Xiu’s chest.

Although contained, the sound of Qi Xiu’s groan was louder than the shield could nullify. He was launched high up in the air by Ye Wei’s fists as his body swayed like a dead leaf in the autumn breeze. He bled out of his mouth and his clothes turned into scraps. He was covered in gashes and bruises, and when he fell onto the ravaged platform, he passed out.